​Poems by Kavita A. Jindal

A womanmay buy a tool-kit and know how to use itmay change the washer, adjust the stopcockswap the ball bearings fix the leaky spigot with a spanner.

A woman may suggest to Naturethat for the next millenniamen become pregnanta facetious fractious suggestion;the woman knows her pleasare just venting, as ineffectualas hammering water.

A woman may not drive in Saudi Arabiamay not bike unless in a ladies’ only parkmay not be seen in public without a male protector.A woman must also be fertiledribbling out male heirs;she may spout songs in privateand dance in full Dior, smeared with make upfor her mirror and other ladies to see.

A village panchayat in Punjab declaresthat mobile phones given to girlsleads them to pre-marital sex; boys can have cell phones and call for helpwhen they’re in trouble, but females,young things, must take it on the chin,remaining on the drip-drip of advancement.

A woman there thinks: what if instead of abortingthe female foetuses, the nozzle was turned offas if by a spell, a sorcery; no babies were bornto the women of this village, then the new eldersall men, would die out without replacementand further afield too the taps would be fixed just soby the women who knew how.

(After ‘Woman’ by Arun Kolatkar) First published on the ‘Feminist Times’ website, 2013

Outings with Daarji

Delhi, 1982

Once a fortnight I would visitAnd he would ask:What have you been meaning to do?What do you want to see? What do you want to eat?

More enquiries would follow:Are you studying enough?Are you sure you want to work for that newspaper?Who would want to be a journalist?

I had a rule of ignoring the latter questions.I would say:I’ve been meaning to see the circus from Russia.I want to eat gol guppasand kulfi falooda from Roshan on Ajmal Khan Road.I want to eat Chole Bhature in Chandni Chowk. I want to visit the Jama Masjidand that most serene gurudwara by Humayun’s Tomb. Take me to the Ram Lila grounds for the final nightof the ten-day enactment.Let’s go to the mela right now to watch the kathputli.

These were how I announced my desires of roaming the city.He’d hail a three-wheeler and we were offto see the Russian acrobats, the lion tamers, the dancing horses,the clown on the unicycleand the trapeze artists who flew highwith no safety nets.

We were off to the kathputli at the mela,which I loved less for the dramatics of the puppeteers,more for the hordes they entertained:the pickpockets, the bag snatchers, the little girls in stretchy red headbandsclutching dainty Disney purses.

We were off to the benches in the maidan for the overnight Ram Lilawhere, that year, in the penultimate sceneRam shot an arrow that missed the actor playing Ravan,who then bent to retrieve the arrow from the stage,stabbing it into his own throat with a deathly cry.The crowd applauded. Serious celebrations could begin.Towering effigies needed to be burnt and fireworks let off.

We were off to the minarets and cusped arches of the Jama Masjid,only to be rebuked for buying a burqaby the shopkeepers in its surrounding alleys,who stiffened but tried to be politeas they detected the turbaned Sikh sightseer: my grandfather.They could tell he was a wounded soulhanging back from them;they sensed he was one of those who’d lost his lands,escaping with just his life to cross the line of partition.They wondered what he was doing at the mosque.They might even have wondered aloud while I bargained with them.They never guessed that this was his indulgence to me.

These unpredictable outings were a treat for him too,I realise that now.Because whatever the response to his questions:What have you been meaning to do?What do you want to see?What do you want to eat?

Whatever the answer (and I was careful not to be too outré)Daarji beamed with delight, checked his walletand hailed an auto rickshaw for the two of us.

About the poet

Kavita A. Jindal is the author of the poetry collection Raincheck Renewed, published to critical acclaim by Chameleon Press. Her short story A Flash of Pepper won the ‘Vintage Books/Foyles Haruki Murakami’ prize in January 2012. Her work has appeared in literary journals, anthologies and newspapers around the world and has been broadcast on BBC Radio 4. Her poems have been translated into Arabic, German, Punjabi, Spanish and Romanian. She is currently the Poetry Editor of Asia Literary Review.www.kavitajindal.com

World’s first major ecopoetry award. With a first prize of £5,000 for the best single poem embracing ecological themes, the award ranks amongst the highest of any English language single poem competition. Second prize is £2,000 and third prize £1,000.